Blame spineless Congress

Friday

Mar 22, 2013 at 6:00 AM

Clive McFarlane

I suspected after the Newtown Elementary School tragedy that many politicians would soon forget the horror of that day and tack strategically back to their de facto status as enablers of the country’s out-of-control gun culture.

I didn’t, however, expect them to be so blatantly dishonorable in their justification of the status quo, which is what is on display in the U.S. Senate, where Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said he will not be able to bring an assault weapons ban provision to the Senate floor as part of larger gun control legislation.

Mr. Reid was tasked with shepherding the president’s comprehensive gun control package through the Senate, a package that includes closing background-check loopholes, making schools safer, increasing access to mental health services, and banning military-style assault weapons and high-capacity magazines.

The president was looking to ban about 160 types of semi-automatic weapons and rifles.

Mr. Reid told Sen. Dianne Feinstein, the California lawmaker who sponsored the weapons ban, that there were not enough votes in the Senate to support the measure, and that any bill with an assault weapons ban would be dead on arrival.

Ms. Feinstein, Mr. Reid said, is free to offer the assault weapons ban as an amendment to the eventual Senate bill, which at the moment might only include a measure that would increase the penalties on those who buy guns from people barred from having them. It is quite possible, given the opposition from Republicans, that the enhanced background checks the president is asking for, which a majority of Americans support, will not be included in the bill.

“The enemies on this are very powerful,” a disappointed Ms. Feinstein said. “I’ve known that all my life.”

But if the National Rifle Association is the enemy to which Ms. Feinstein was referring, she would be wrong on this particular occasion. The enemies this time are the enablers in Congress.

What Mr. Reid didn’t say was that the weapons ban is a fight he would rather not wage. Indeed, it has been reported that he told a Nevada television station that, “given the current political environment, it might be futile to move an assault-weapons ban through Congress.”

In addition, some say Mr. Reid was more worried about holding on to 20 Democratic-held Senate seats that will be contested in the 2014 elections.

Vice President Joe Biden was a key architect of Mr. Obama’s gun control legislation, and yesterday he vowed to continue pressing for an assault weapons ban. And in a move that is largely uncharacteristic in politics these days, he had pointed words for his colleagues in the Senate.

“Three months ago a deranged man walked into Newtown Elementary School with a weapon of war, and that weapon of war has no place on American streets, and taking it off American Streets has no impact on one’s constitutional rights to own a weapon,” he said in New York yesterday.

He noted that when the previous ban on assault weapons was in effect, “there were no constitutional challenges to its legality that went anywhere.”

“This is not about anybody’s constitutional right to own a weapon,” the vice president said.

“Tell me how it violates anyone’s constitutional rights to be limited to a (magazine) clip that holds 10 rounds instead of 30, or in Aurora, a hundred.

“This is a false choice being presented to the American people by those taking on our positions here. We have a responsibility to act ... It must be awful being in public office and concluding that even though you might believe you should take action that you can’t take action because of the political consequences you face.